Salvation Looks Like a Mobil Sign
by Gratiae
Summary: Dr. Spencer Reid simply can't catch a break. Response to a 1000-word challenge. Writing exercise. One-Shot.


**Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds.**

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November 22, 2008

Calliope Sellers was angry and annoyed. She sat in the passenger seat of her boyfriend's ancient Volvo Amazon with her body turned slightly so her back was partially to him as she looked out the window into the pitch-black expanse of God-Only-Knows-Where, Virginia. If they were in Virginia at all. She didn't know where they were. Neither did the boyfriend, for that matter. She had never been in this situation before, never not known where she was. All she knew was she was alone with him in the middle of nowhere with no cell reception and no map. Not that a map would have helped, because, apparently, they weren't too fond of street signs in God-Only-Knows-Where, Virginia.

She kept her back to him and stared out into nothingness. She hated this stupid trip. She hated this stupid car. She hated this ridiculously rocky dirt road. She hated the terrible suspension in the stupid car for making her feel every single hump, bump and pothole in this ridiculously rocky dirt road. She hated that the stupid radio in this stupid car produced nothing but static. She hated that the GPS was dead. She hated that the cigarette lighter in this stupid car was broken so she couldn't charge the GPS, but it probably wouldn't have gotten reception anyway. She hated that some creep had reached into the back of the car and taken their map while they had been getting coffee in a dirty, disgusting diner. She hated that boyfriend had left the windows down while they were getting coffee in the dirty, disgusting diner so that some creep could reach in the back and take their map. She hated that the kid at the Piggly Wiggly they'd stopped at for directions when they'd realized the map was gone had given them such convoluted directions they left the store more lost than they'd entered it. She hated that she'd let boyfriend talk her into this in the first place.

"I'm sorry," he sighed.

She said nothing, simply turned a little farther away from him and huffed. She was tired, it had been raining all day, she was wet, she was cold, she had no coffee, she didn't know where she was, she didn't know what time it was because the stupid car's stupid clock had stopped somewhere back in stupid nineteen seventy-something and she wasn't about to ask stupid boyfriend what time it was. She glanced back at the worthless iPhone in her hand and sneered at the Out-Of-Service announcement still mocking her across the touch screen. For something that people sometimes hailed as the second coming, the stupid phone sat in her hand simply another lame mobile waiting to crap out when she needed it most. She wanted to hurl it out into the nothingness, but then, if they ever found reception again, it really would be worthless. No, she'd keep her temper in check, or at least keep the phone inside the car. Her temper? She made no promises.

Dr. Spencer Reid sighed and kept his eyes on the road. His sweetheart was angry with him. He wished he hadn't convinced her to come on this trip, wished he hadn't even thought it up in the first place. The entire day had been one disastrous event after another. If they ever found their way back home again it would probably be filed in the Guinness Book of World Records under the title of "Most Horrifically Failed Date Since the Garden of Eden." Now all he needed to do was eat an onion, have an allergic reaction, drink himself drunk off of liquid Benadryl and reenact that scene in the park from the commercials for that _Hitch_ movie he'd never watched. But, with they way their day was going, he would simply die from anaphylactic shock. Wouldn't that be a grand ending?

He'd been trying to impress her. She painted. That was his sweetheart's profession: painting. Besides being able to regurgitated facts about painters and paintings, he had little experience in the artistic world in which she lived. He had seen an advertisement for an art fair a in a small, podunk town a few hours drive west of Fredericksburg where the annual art fair was the only news worth telling. The ad had promised several 'phenomenal' artists and he'd hoped his sweetheart would like it.

They never made it to the fair.

It was eleven o'clock at night, it had been pouring raining since noon, he had no idea where they were and, if he didn't find a fuel station in the next several minutes, it wouldn't matter if they were lost because they wouldn't be _going_ anywhere. This had never happened to him. Several things that had happened today had never happened to him before. He'd never gotten lost before, he'd never let himself run so dangerously close to having an empty gas tank, he'd never sat next to his sweetheart and have her utterly refuse to talk to him, he'd never had the courage to plan a date like this (and, after this disaster, he doubted he ever would again), and he'd never thought he'd ever be this desperate to make someone happy, much less a woman he'd been dating for three months.

He stopped for a moment at a fork in the road and debated going left or right, because whichever way he chose could be the death or salvation of the gas tank. Praying silently, he turned left and drove on. He heaved a heavy sigh of relief when the light of the Mobile sign came into view and, scant minutes later, they pulled off the dirt road onto the asphalt lot. After exchanging cash for gas and good, solid directions, he slipped back into the car and pulled back out. They'd driven another half-hour in silence when he felt her slender fingers thread through his. He glanced over to see her still staring expressionlessly out into nothingness.

But at least she held his hand.

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**A/N:**

**There is no quote for this, because it's inspired by a challenge to write a 1000 word vignette prompted by a provided picture because "a picture's worth a 1000 words." Hur, hur, hur. So witty. Anyways... [flicker .com/photos/redshoesgirl/4591349070/] That's the picture. Just omit the spaces between the flicker and the .com...**

**These characters, of course, are the two lead protagonists in most of my one-shots and in my multi-chapter _Mystery Muse_. If you want to find out more about Dr. Reid and Ms. Sellers you now know where to find it! I hope you enjoyed this vignette and enjoy the rest of my _Mystery Muse_ universe. **

**Thank you so, so much for reading! Once again, I hope you enjoyed it and, please, tell me what you think! Good or bad.**

**Love, Thalia**


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